Dog of the week – Sole

Sole doing what she does best

This is Sole (sorry girl but I haven’t quite worked out how to insert the grave over the “e” so that your name is spelt properly!).

Sole is one of our many dogs and one of my absolute favourites. She is, true to her name, a dog who keeps her own counsel – she can be a sulky bitch at times and she will get a bit short with annoying little puppies and anyone else who picks the wrong moment to bother her.

Sole may be suffering from what we can best describe as a sub-clinical canine depression – sometimes she will just give you that willyoujustgetouttamyface!! look and we just leave her to lie around on the couch or the bed for a while – she perks up sooner or later – though sometimes this can last for a couple of days at a time. And no, we haven’t investigated the possibility of getting a canine version of Zoloft or similar antidepressant – though a quick search for canine depression reveals some really disturbing results – people actually give their dogs their own prescribed medicine!

Sole is a very fast runner – the fastest of all our dogs and we’ve clocked her at over 40 km/h for short bursts! She has a bit of arthritis in her left front leg that affects her more in the cold winters we have here at Yuendumu so in the cold time we usually leave her in the car when we drop the other dogs off for their daily run – she gets her exercise at the end of the run when we walk for a few kilometres to catch up with the runners.

Sole is also very strong-willed and she won’t do something she doesn’t want to. She is great with little joeys when we get them in – she will shepherd them around and protect them from the boofheads and bullies in the pack who think that a baby kangaroo is some new kind of mobile stuffed toy…or dinner. And, because little joeys can’t sh*t for themselves (in the wild their mothers stimulate their anus to prompt the release of fluids etc – you work it out) Sole (and a couple of others) perform that sterling service when we have to change their nappies…yes, our joeys wear nappies…otherwise the house would really be a mess!